College of Arts, Sciences, and Education

Dear CASE community,

Welcome to the fall 2025 semester! After a calm summer, our college is alive again with the sights and sounds of a new academic year. We are thrilled to welcome hundreds of new students, along with nine outstanding faculty members who have joined our college:

We will introduce these new colleagues in upcoming newsletters.

I would also like to inform both new and returning students that, to assist with course planning for this year and the next two, CASE has prepared a Three Year Course Plan. Please take a look to see when the courses you wish to take will be offered.

Let the adventure begin!

Warm regards, 

Mehrzad Boroujerdi, Ph.D.
Vice Provost and Dean
College of Arts, Sciences, and Education

Missouri S&T’s Elementary Classroom Teacher program has earned the ILA National Recognition for the Preparation of Literacy Professionals for five years, from August 2025 through August 2030. This designation confirms that the program meets the ILA Standards for the Preparation of Literacy Professionals (2017) and highlights S&T’s commitment to advancing excellence and equity in literacy education worldwide.

Biological sciences and environmental science faculty showcased the  diversity of Missouri’s wildlife to audiences at the Missouri State Fair this August.

Ozark Research Field Station Director Dr. Dave Duvernell, along with Dr. Steve Roberts, Dr. Robin Verble, field station caretaker Lilly Germeroth, and undergraduates Michael Scott and Carson Arnold, repaired and replaced the station’s deck, creating an improved space for classes, camps and other activities.

Dr. Kul Bhasin, PhD Physics’76, and Charlotte Bhasin, Psych’77, have generously donated $22,000 in support of the physics department, the Astro Lab and the Observatory.

The chemistry department has purchased a potentiostat -- an electrochemistry instrument valued at approximately $20,000 -- for use in both teaching and outreach activities. This acquisition would not have been possible without the generous contribution of chemistry alumnus Charles Schroeder, Chem’73, and Martha Schroeder, matched by funds from the South-Central Missouri Local Section of the American Chemical Society.

CASE leadership are deeply grateful to both for their support.

The support of our donors is instrumental in advancing our College (CASE). Your contributions play a vital role in meeting our diverse needs. Whether it's assisting students facing challenges or investing in faculty development initiatives, your generosity significantly enriches the educational experience we provide. To support CASE, contact Michelle Shults, senior development officer, at shultsm@mst.edu or call 573-341-4380.

Rachael Woolfork joins the CASE office as executive assistant. Woolfork began her career in higher education in 2019, working as an administrative associate III for Texas A&M University-Central Texas. During this time, her roles and responsibilities covered everything from enrollment management to curriculum to technical support. Most recently, she worked as an HR assistant for the U.S. Army as a government civilian. Woolfork says she is excited to bridge both worlds and bring her higher education and HR experience to the role.

Outside of the office, Woolfork is an avid reader and considers herself a lifelong learner whose interests include education, public policy, community theater, painting and hiking. Most weekends, you can find her at a nearby park exploring new trails and documenting flowers. She and her husband, Joseph, are outdoor enthusiasts who hope to visit every U.S. National Park and are well on their way to completing their shared goal.

Woolfork recently moved to the Rolla area and is excited to become more involved and learn more about the local community.

Cadet LeeAnn Ford, a member of Missouri S&T’s Class of 2025, was awarded the U.S. Army Reserve Command Truman Citizen-Soldier Award during Cadet Summer Training at Fort Knox, Kentucky, in July 2025. This honor recognizes her as the top U.S. Army Reserve Cadet in a training regiment of more than 500 students from across the nation. Ford distinguished herself through outstanding performance in a wide range of military skills and leadership assessments, including rifle marksmanship, land navigation, and physical fitness. Her achievement reflects both exceptional individual ability and a deep commitment to service. Upon graduation, Ford will be commissioned as a second lieutenant in the U.S. Army Reserve, continuing the legacy of excellence established by Missouri S&T’s "Stonehenge Battalion" Army ROTC.

Ethan Kleine, a double major in computer science and applied mathematics, plays a lead role on Missouri S&T’s Formula Electric Design Team. As last year’s software lead and this year’s data acquisition lead, he has managed software development for the car’s dashboard, fault controller, and most notably, its car controller — the system responsible for coordinating motor and battery operations, throttle, ignition and more. Kleine says his math background has helped him tackle the complexity of writing code for so many components, contributing to the team’s strong performance at last summer’s competition.

Physics graduate student Dishari Malakar attended a summer school organized by the NSF AI Institute for Artificial Intelligence and Fundamental Interactions. The summer school was held in August at Harvard University. Malakar was among the participants in the Hackathon, and her team won the “Best Project” award. She worked on domain adaptation in strong lensing.

Kapil Dev Sharma, a doctoral candidate in physics, defended his dissertation titled “Advanced Density Functional Theory Simulations of Transition Metal and Rare Earth Compounds: From Deep Earth to Weyl Semimetals” on August 4. His advisor was Dr. Aleksandr Chernatynskiy.

The Missouri S&T iGEM team earned first place for their research poster, “Metlock: A Biomining Library,” at the 5th Annual Workshop for the Resilient Supply of Critical Minerals. Team members presenting the project included biology majors Julian Foat, Ethan Beane, and Lindsay Schneider, along with biomedical engineering majors Tristan Crawford and Austin Thrasher. The team is advised by Dr. Katie Shannon and Dr. Dave Westenberg of biological sciences.

Missouri S&T’s Mars Rover Design Team was crowned world champions at the University Rover Challenge, held May 28–31 in Hanksville, Utah. Competing against top international teams, the students excelled in the science task, using custom-built instruments to collect and analyze soil samples. Their rover, Talos, navigated rugged terrain to investigate sites for signs of past water activity and potential habitability. Team members Gabriel Duncan, Sofia Tripp, Lauren Booth, Aster Davidson, Remy Mathenia, and Morgan Johnson impressed NASA-selected judges with their precise rover operation, strong data analysis, and innovative design. The win continues Missouri S&T’s tradition of excellence in the competition and highlights the university’s leadership in hands-on, student-driven engineering. 

Dr. Mehrzad Boroujerdi, CASE Dean, presented a paper and chaired a panel at the 10th Biennial Convention of the Association for the Study of Persianate Societies, held in Tashkent, Uzbekistan this August.

Dr. victoria braegger, assistant professor of English and technical communication, published a chapter titled "Turns in Game Studies: An Interview with Kishonna L. Gray" in Historiographies of Game Studies: What it Has Been, What it Could Be. The chapter begins with Dr. Gray’s lighthearted story of grad school procrastination and her path into game studies, then shifts to a critical discussion of exclusion within scholarly circles and the challenges of gaining recognition in the field. The volume is available open access through Punctum Books.

From April through July, Dr. Martin Bohner, Curators’ Distinguished Professor of mathematics and statistics, delivered several invited presentations while on sabbatical. He gave plenary talks at the International Meeting on Applied Mathematics in Errachidia (IMAME’2025) in Morocco (April 22–25), the 9th International Arab Conference on Mathematics and Computations (IACMC 2025) at Zarqa University in Jordan (May 7–9), and the Dynamic Equations on Time Scales conference at the Banach Center in Poland (June 9–12). He also gave a colloquium talk at Tafila Technical University in Jordan (May 11). From May 26 to July 4, Bohner visited the economics department at the University of Messina in Sicily, collaborating with Professors Giuseppe Caristi and David Barilla, and presenting a plenary talk at the "APPLMATH25" conference.

Dr. Gerald Cohen, professor of philosophy, was one of two professors interviewed by National Public Radio about the origin of the term "dude." 

Dr. Jessica Cundiff, associate professor of psychological science, recently published an article in Psychology of Women Quarterly titled “WAGES-Classroom (Workshop Activity for Gender Equity Simulation): Using Pedagogical Frameworks to Address Challenges of Bias Interventions.” Drawing on three longitudinal studies, her research explores how pedagogical frameworks can be used to teach about gender bias and motivate action to address it.

This summer, Dr. Kathryn Dolan, chair and professor of English and technical communication, co-chaired the sixteenth biennial conference of the Association for the Study of Literature and Environment (ASLE), “Collective Atmospheres,” held in College Park, Maryland. ASLE is the leading professional organization for U.S. and international scholars in ecocriticism.

Dr. Yue-Wern Huang, CASE associate dean for research and external relations and professor of biological sciences, together with former S&T faculty member Dr. Yang Wang and his former student Dr. Weixing Hao, received a patent for a “System and Method for Simulating a Respiratory System.” The team developed a novel device capable of generating representative secondhand electronic cigarette smoke — a breakthrough that led to an NSF-funded project to study e-cigarette aerosol and its health impacts. During the early pandemic, Wang screened more than 200 fabrics for aerosol filtration to identify optimal mask materials. Building on this work, Huang proposed combining select fabrics to mimic human respiratory tract function. Within three months, the team had assembled and calibrated the system, which successfully matched the ICRP model. Since then, they have published several papers using the device, which exemplifies the powerful intersection of life science and engineering.

Dr. Chen Hou, associate professor of biological sciences, and his graduate student, Fahimeh Taheri, recently published a peer-reviewed article in Mechanisms of Ageing and Development titled “Energetic Cost of Biosynthesis Modulates the Growth-Longevity Tradeoff in Mice: Quantitative Insights into Four Lifespan-Altering Manipulations.”

Dr. Beth Kania-Gosche, chair and professor of education, co-authored an  article with Ximena Uribe-Zarain of Missouri State University and Mark Hogrebe of Washington University in St. Louis, in the open-access journal Mid-Western Educational Researcher. Titled “Does Educator Preparation Align with State Standards? A Factor Analysis of Missouri’s First Year Teacher Survey,” the article stems from their collaborative work as Data Fellows for the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.

Dr. Wumaier Maimaitiyiming, assistant teaching professor of mathematics, has been named a 2025 Engineering Unleashed Fellow by the Kern Family Foundation. This national recognition honors leadership in undergraduate engineering education. Engineering Unleashed is a community of more than 5,300 members representing 385 institutions, powered by KEEN — a partnership of 70 universities dedicated to graduating engineers with an entrepreneurial mindset who are prepared to create societal, personal and economic value.

Dr. Shelley Minteer, the Dr. Ken Robertson Memorial Professor in Chemistry and director of the Kummer Institute Center for Resource Sustainability, was awarded a $19.8 million collaborative agreement to renew the National Science Foundation’s Center for Synthetic Organic Electrochemistry. This chemical innovation center will be led by the chemistry department and the university will partner with 13 additional institutions on the grant.

Dr. Simeon Mistakidis, assistant professor of physics, co-authored an experiment–theory study with collaborators from Purdue University that was published in the journal Physical Review Letters. Their article, “Collapse of a Quantum Vortex in an Attractive Two-Dimensional Bose Gas,” reports the first observation of a quantum vortex in a superfluid collapsing into a spinning, self-trapped structure known as a vortex soliton. These findings open new avenues for exploring unstable quantum matter with attractive interactions, offering insights of broad interest to the atomic physics, condensed matter and nonlinear optics communities.

Dr. Ross C. Reed, lecturer of philosophy, published an article titled “Why Leisure Matters for a Good Life, According to Aristotle” in The Conversation on Aug. 5. The article was published in Spanish and Danish as well.

Dr. Shun Saito, assistant professor of physics, received a $456,936 grant from the National Science Foundation for a project titled “Lyman-alpha intensity mapping in the Hobby-Eberly Telescope Dark Energy Experiment.”

Dr. Kathleen Sheppard, professor of history and political science, delivered two invited lectures this summer. On July 21, she spoke to the Egyptian Study Society in Denver, Colorado, presenting “Tea with King Tutankhamun at the Winter Palace Hotel.” The lecture explored the conflicts surrounding the discovery of King Tutankhamun’s tomb — questions of ownership, the fate of the artifacts, and who had the authority to decide. From the small tomb in the Valley of the Kings to the grand Winter Palace Hotel in Luxor, Sheppard traced how the struggle over Tutankhamun’s legacy unfolded. On Aug. 2, she gave a second lecture at Southern Methodist University for the North Texas chapter of the American Research Center in Egypt. Her talk, “The Dahabeah Dining Society during the Golden Age of Travel in Egypt,” examined how social interactions among Egyptologists helped shape the foundations of the discipline.

Dr. Gina L. C. Yosten,  Kummer Endowed Chair and professor of biological sciences, earned a $708,000 strategic research award from the Breakthrough T1D Foundation (formerly the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation). The project will use an advanced technique called spatial molecular imaging on human pancreas samples to better understand why some individuals are more susceptible to type 1 diabetes than others. Yosten will collaborate with Missouri S&T colleagues Dr. Grant Kolar, research professor of biological sciences, and Dr. Joshua Stafford, assistant research professor of biological sciences, as well as Dr. Willis K. Samson, professor of pharmacology and physiology at Saint Louis University School of Medicine.

 

Disclaimer: CASE does not endorse the viewpoints presented in the essays featured in this section of the newsletter. We share these essays purely as "food for thought" and encourage our informed audience to independently evaluate and form their own opinions on the topics discussed.

College of Arts, Sciences, and Education

Missouri University of Science and Technology

Missouri S&T Rolla, MO 65409
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